Bilingual Settings Research Articles

First Language Attrition: The Effects of English (L2) on Brazilian Portuguese VOT Patterns in an L1-Dominant Environment

*Atrito de língua materna: os efeitos do inglês (L2) nos padrões de VOT do português brasileiro em um ambiente de L1 dominante*Partindo de uma visão de linguagem como um Sistema Adaptativo Complexo (CAS) (BECKNER et al., 2009; DE BOT et al., 2013), este trabalho discute o atrito linguístico. Seguindo esse trabalho, neste estudo, verificamos possíveis efeitos de atrito no português entre aprendizes de inglês residentes no Brasil (contexto de L1 dominante). Analisamos o VOT (Voice Onset Time) de plosivas bilabiais e velares, surdas e sonoras, em posição inicial de palavra do PB. Participaram do estudo 33 sujeitos, residentes em Porto Alegre. Os participantes foram divididos em 3 grupos (11 monolíngues do PB, 11 aprendizes de inglês de nível intermediário e 11 aprendizes avançados). Todos os participantes realizaram, individualmente, um teste de leitura de palavras do PB. Testes ANOVA demonstraram uma diferença significativa entre os grupos nas produções em português referentes à consoante velar surda, sugerindo o atrito nesse segmento. Não foram, entretanto, encontradas diferenças significativas entre aprendizes de nível intermediário e avançado. Os resultados, ainda que sugiram que o atrito seja menos comum em contextos de L1 dominante, não nos permitem descartar a possibilidade de ocorrência de tal fenômeno, provendo evidências de que, em contexto bilíngue, a transferência linguística possa ser bidirecional.

Bilingual instruction in early childhood education, can it better develop children?

This is a case study of teaching and learning using bilingual instruction in two schools of Early Childhood Education in Kupang-NTT, Indonesia. The aims of this study are to find out whether or not bilingual instruction in Early Childhood Education can better develop children (the outcomes) and if the issue of ‘the younger, the better” in children’s language acquisition in bilingual setting is acceptable and true. 4 students from one bilingual and one monolingual schools have been observed. In addition, parents and teachers of these students have also been interviewed. The data has then been analyzed qualitatively to come to the answers of the proposed questions, and the results reveal that bilingual instruction alone does not necessarily create better children unless it is supported by other factors, such as encouraging parents, professional teachers, and supporting environment. This is in a line with the findings of the issue about ‘the younger, the better’ in children’s language acquisition, that the younger does not always mean the better. Other aforementioned factors are needed in the development of children’s language acquisition. It’s recommended that all parties involved in children’s development can take part in developing their skills, knowledge as well as characters.

Dominance of Ukrainian in the bilingual setting: neurocognitive factors

This paper focuses on the problem of Ukrainians’ individual bilingualism when out of the two languages – Ukrainian and Russian – the dominant one is Russian, which, being in dissonance with the political dominance of Ukrainian, causes societal tension. Its alleviation requires understanding the nature of bilingualism dependent on a number of interrelated neurocognitive and societal factors that determine dominance of the individual's particular language. The paper consecutively discusses such issues as: interaction of socio-political and individual planes of Ukrainian bilingualism as a psychological problem, neurocognitive and societal factors of linguistic dominance in their interplay, as well as applicability of these factors in creating conditions for the shifts of Ukrainian as L2 in the direction of its individual dominance. Pivotal are the prerequisites relevant for improving Ukrainian as the subdominant language for different age group defined with regard to particulars of the sensitive and post-sensitive periods for language acquisition.

Diglossic patterns of language use among speakers of Zoroastrian Dari ethnolect

ABSTRACTThis study investigates diglossic patterns of language use by speakers of Zoroastrian Dari in the city of Yazd, where most of Zoroastrian population of Iran lives. Efforts have been made to find out how, when and why the spoken language of Dari is favoured by Zoroastrian community members. For this reason, the evaluation by the informants of their abilities in the majority language, i.e. Persian, their different mother tongue behaviours, motivational factors for their use of their mother tongue and domains of their mother tongue use were specifically investigated. The participants were male/female students/teachers of Zoroastrian schools and members of charitable establishments for older Zoroastrians, hence from a wide range of age groups. Information about linguistic behaviours of the target group was obtained qualitatively through interviews, diaries and participant observations in specific settings, and quantitatively through written questionnaires based on Kouzmin’'s work (1998), as well as several other studies analysing domains of language use in bilingual and diglossic settings. Moreover, the effects of education, sex and age in the perceptions, attitudes and speech behaviours of Zoroastrian community and the significance of differences were explored. The results indicate different sociocultural factors at work in determining the participants’ choice of linguistic codes.

Tapping into the Intellectual Capital at the University

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) is as full of challenges as it is of possibilities. We will explore the challenges while seeking realistic solutions as eight Computer Science professors teach their subjects through English for the first time. We hope to gain insights into the bilingual classroom at the university level where teacher training can aid in professional development. Kevin Haines (2017) has posed the question about policies, principles and practice in bilingual settings, suggesting that we still need to address the challenging question: 'who will support the teachers?' In this paper we will observe problems and solutions to bilingual teaching from the ethnographic point of view of action research. We hold that research in education must make the move toward a more qualitative assessment. As researchers, perhaps we need to describe less and do more by putting our research into action.

CzEngClass – Towards a Lexicon of Verb Synonyms with Valency Linked to Semantic Roles

Abstract In this paper, we introduce our ongoing project about synonymy in bilingual context. This project aims at exploring semantic ‘equivalence’ of verb senses of generally different verbal lexemes in a bilingual (Czech-English) setting. Specifically, it focuses on their valency behavior within such equivalence groups. We believe that using bilingual context (translation) as an important factor in the delimitation of classes of synonymous lexical units (verbs, in our case) may help to specify the verb senses, also with regard to the (semantic) roles relation to other verb senses and roles of their arguments more precisely than when using monolingual corpora. In our project, we work “bottom-up”, i.e., from an evidence as recorded in our corpora and not “top-down”, from a predefined set of semantic classes.

Acquisition of adjectives in a bilingual setting: A developmental profile of Turkish–Danish bilinguals

AbstractAcquisition of adjectives by bilingual Turkish children have been touched upon by

Empowering minorities. Pathways for basque language integration in a bilingual setting

Introduction: The Basque Country is a bilingual setting, where a significant part of the population have Basque as its mother tongue. The Basque NHS, Osakidetza, offers public universal assistance. It adopts an integrated approach through merging hospitals and primary care to achieve better quality of care and efficiency. Communicating in the mother tongue helps patients enjoy equitable and better care. In this context the first clinical pathway in Basque has been recently set up reflecting patient centered care, where fostering Basque is a safety and quality issue. Organization, objectives and result management of the bilingual pathways: Pathways are started from the general practitioners´ (GP) surgeries. Medical consultations, information booklets, test results and informed consents are bilingual. When specialized care is needed, the GP must also point out the patients` language preference by means of an on line request to the specialist. This means that there is a direct clinical pathway available entirely in Basque, from primary to specialized care. This paper offers an evaluation of the bilingual pathway established in 2015 at the urology unit at Debagoiena Integrated Health Organisation (IHO) and paediatric urology at Araba IHO where weekly consultations were provided. During the first year, 987 consultations in Basque were counted in Debagoiena unit, that is, 21.3% of the total. These figures closely reflect the language profile of the local population where, although 60.5% are Basque speakers, only 28.3% use the language on a daily basis. Considering that 25% of the specialists are fluent Basque speakers, only 56% of these patients could be offered the full pathway in Basque. Nevertheless, 100% of them have shown their full commitment to the scheme. The most remarkable results were found amongst the Araba IHO users, in the paediatric urology service. 18.6% of the consultations were in Basque. Considering that just 23% of the population speaks Basque in Araba, this appears to be a high percentage. All those who request provision in Basque can enjoy it, as all the urologist at this unit are bilingual. 100% of the patients assert their satisfaction with the pathway. Although patients were given assitance in Basque, the majority of online notifications between consultants were answered back in Spanish. Conclusions: In line with patient centered care, Basque language pathways have been developed, improving Basque use, patients self-esteem and empowerment. This step forward is specially important in Araba, striving for the positive development of quality care in a bilingual setting. Despite these facts, there is still hard work to be done regarding the normalisation of the Basque language, especially because nowadays Basque is not a common means of comunication between professionals.

Classroom discourse in bilingual secondary science: language as medium or language as dialectic?

ABSTRACTThis paper examines how the nature of language is represented in science lessons taught through English, and is part of a project investigating the challenges of bilingual education in Hong Kong's junior secondary classes. Educational linguistics, particularly work drawing on systemic functional linguistics, sees language as text and as dialectic. This understanding of language is contrasted with more atheoretical conceptualisations such as language as vocabulary and language as medium. Recordings of the secondary one (Grade 7) science classes, along with interviews with teachers and students and also student questionnaires, were mined for instances where language was foregrounded, for example by explicit reference or by use of L1 Cantonese. These instances were then considered in terms of the conceptualisations of language, and were found to tend towards a language as vocabulary and language as medium orientation. Sample extracts are used to illustrate these points. The disadvantages of these interpretations of the nature of language are discussed, and related to what is currently understood of the role of language in learning science in bilingual settings.

The Use of Hungarian and Serbian in the City of Szabadka/Subotica : An Empirical Study

In this study Ferdinand and Komlosi analyze the use of Hungarian and Serbian in the city of Szabadka/Subotica, which is located in the Serbian region of Northern Vajdaság/Vojvodina. A mostly Hungarian speaking city for centuries, Szabadka/Subotica suffered the strong pro-Serbian language policy implemented by the Yugoslavian government from the end of the First World War until the dismantlement of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, which gave Hungarian and other local minority languages a second chance to survive. Nowadays, Szabadka/Subotica is home to two main language groups, southern Slavic languages such a Serbian and Croatian (over sixty per cent) and Hungarian (thirty three per cent). Although Ferdinand and Komlosi employed official figures from the Serbian censuses to determine the size of each group, the situation of each language was mapped through empirical observation of language use in informal conversations, in official signage, and in permanent as well as temporary commercial signage. The results show that the role of Serbian (mostly written in Latin script) is dominant in almost all spheres of public life and as a lingua franca among various groups. Nevertheless, Hungarian maintains a strong presence in the city, especially in the center and in its northwestern districts. In this paper, Ferdinand and Komlosi aim to contribute to a better general understanding of group dynamics in bilingual settings and, specifically, to provide a clearer view of the language situation in one of the Hungarian-speaking regions lost by the historic Kingdom of Hungary after World War I.

Young children capitalising on their entire language repertoire for language learning at school

ABSTRACTWhile translanguaging has been well researched in bilingual settings with older pupils and has been found to contribute to cognitive and personal development, there is little research on translanguaging of young multilinguals. In trilingual Luxembourg, at school, children learn Luxembourgish aged 4, German aged 6 and French aged 7, with the majority not speaking Luxembourgish on school entry. The number of languages to be learned may leave teachers little space to capitalise on home languages and encourage translanguaging. Drawing on qualitative methods, this paper contextualises and examines the practice and purposes of translanguaging of nursery and primary school children who speak a language other than Luxembourgish at home, while they collaboratively produce oral texts on the iPad app iTEO. The data stem from a longitudinal study using a multi-method approach. The findings indicate that the children made use of their multilingual repertoire in order to communicate, construct knowledge and mark their multilingual identity. Translanguaging was a frequent and legitimate practice in both classes although the older children drew less on home languages other than Luxembourgish. The children’s ability to translanguage and their opportunities for doing so were influenced by the multilingual learning environment, the curriculum and the language learning tasks.

The Threshold Hypothesis revisited: Bilingual lexical knowledge and non-verbal IQ development

Aims and objectives:The threshold hypothesis is one of the most influential theoretical frameworks on the relation between bilingualism and cognition. This hypothesis suggests a bilingual cognitive disadvantage at a low proficiency level and a cognitive advantage at a high proficiency level in both languages. The aim of our study is to contribute to the operationalisation of the threshold hypothesis by analysing parental support for L1 and its influence on the cognitive development of bilingual children.Data and analysis:We analyse data from 100 Turkish–English successive bilingual children and from their parents, and investigate the relation between bilingualism and cognition. The data from the children are scores on receptive and productive vocabulary tests and a non-verbal intelligence test (Raven’s Coloured Progressive Matrices). In addition, the parents filled in a questionnaire on language use at home and a questionnaire on language dominance.Findings and conclusions:Our study shows a bilingual advantage for those children whose parents use more L1 at home and have higher dominance scores for L1. These children outperform the monolingual control groups in our study in terms of non-verbal intelligence scores.Originality:The originality of the present study resides in the fact that, to our knowledge, for the first time parental support for L1 and dominance in L1 is linked to the cognitive development of the children.Significance and implications:In this way, we can operationalise the threshold hypothesis and get further insights in the relation between bilingualism and cognition. This will allow informed decisions on the use and support for L1 in bilingual families.Limitations:One limitation of the present study is the fact that our sample is only from middle-class families, and conclusions about other bilingual settings are therefore limited.

Teaching and learning science in linguistically diverse classrooms

In this paper we reflect on the article, Science education in a bilingual class: problematising a translational practice, by Zeynep Ünsal, Britt Jakobson, Bengt-Olav Molander and Per-Olaf Wickman (Cult Stud Sci Educ, doi:10.1007/s11422-016-9747-3). In their article, the authors present the results of a classroom research project by responding to one main question: How is continuity between everyday language and the language of science construed in a bilingual science classroom where the teacher and the students do not speak the same minority language? Specifically, Ünsal et al. examine how bilingual students construe relations between everyday language and the language of science in a class taught in Swedish, in which all students also spoke Turkish, whereas the teacher also spoke Bosnian, both being minority languages in the context of Swedish schools. In this forum, we briefly discuss why close attention to bilingual dynamics emerging in classrooms such as those highlighted by Ünsal et al. matters for science education. We continue by discussing changing ontologies in relation to linguistic diversity and education more generally. Recent research in bilingual immersion classroom settings in so-called “content” subjects such as Content and Language Integrated Learning, is then introduced, as we believe this research offers some significant insights in terms of how bilingualism contributes to knowledge building in subjects such as science. Finally, we offer some reflections in relation to the classroom interactional competence needed by teachers in linguistically diverse classrooms. In this way, we aim to further the discussion initiated by Ünsal et al. and to offer possible frameworks for future research on bilingualism in science education. In their article, Ünsal et al. conclude the analysis of the classroom data by arguing in favor of a translanguaging pedagogy, an approach to teaching and learning in which students’ whole language repertoires are used as valuable resources for constructing meaning and for developing academic competences in the language of instruction. This is a conclusion that we support wholeheartedly and an educational practice that we hope to promote with this forum discussion.

Students’ Perceptions of the Use of English at a Bilingual Setting Based on Their Kindergarten Language Background

Students’ Perceptions of the Use of English at a Bilingual Setting Based on Their Kindergarten Language Background

Second-generation NYC bilinguals’ use of the Spanish subjunctive in obligatory contexts

This paper analyzes naturalistic data from second-generation NYC bilinguals on their obligatory subjunctive use. First-generation NYC Spanish speakers serve as the reference model for the nine obligatory semantic & syntactic contexts. A total of 52 consultants are considered, 26 for each generation, from the six primary Spanish-speaking groups in NYC: Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban, Mexican, Ecuadorian, and Colombian. The objective is to determine, through quantitative and qualitative investigation, whether the second-generation’s obligatory subjunctive use has changed, and if so, to establish exactly where and how it differs from the first-generation, thus contributing to the variationist-sociolinguistic knowledge of Spanish grammar in bilingual settings. Statistically significant external and internal findings show that the two generational groups do in fact use the obligatory subjunctive differently. Close examination, however, suggests that second-generation bilinguals generally command obligatory subjunctive use, but do exhibit signs of a variable mood grammar.

Comprehension of Ironic Utterances by Bilingual Children

Abstract This study investigates verbal irony comprehension by 6-year old bilingual children speaking Polish and English and living in the USA. Researchers have predominantly focused on monolingual populations when examining non-literal language in young children. This is the first exploratory study of how irony is comprehended by children growing up in a bilingual setting. Results suggest that 6-year olds from this population score high in decoding the intended meaning behind an ironic utterance and that there is a relation between this ability and the development of their theory of mind (ToM). Interestingly, the data suggests that in the tested sample, no difference could be observed between comprehension of sarcastic irony (i.e., irony containing the element of blame directed towards the addressee) and non-sarcastic irony (irony without criticism towards the interlocutor). The results may be a basis for assuming that irony comprehension may be different in bilingual, compared to monolingual, samples.

Learning Schoolscapes in a Minority Setting

AbstractIn my paper, I present a qualitative approach to the linguistic landscape of Hungarian schools in Sepsiszentgyörgy/Sfântu Gheorghe, Romania. These landscapes are called schoolscapes as they represent the material environment where texts and images “constitute, reproduce and transform language ideologies” (Brown 2012: 282). These manifestations reveal a lot about language learning and teaching in a formal educational environment. Beyond the simple representations of languages in education, we may trace more or less hidden curriculum details of foreign- and second-language teaching (English/German, Romanian) in a Hungarian-Romanian dominant bilingual setting. My aim is to describe the visual manifestations of the differences and similarities between the languages taught to minority children and the mutual efforts of teachers and students to meet the basic challenges of learning and teaching these languages.

Historical literacy in bilingual settings: Cognitive academic language in CLIL history narratives

Language competence has proven to vary substantially across school disciplines. This paper explores historical literacy, a major research issue in current European language policies. Specifically, it reviews the literature on how history content relies on language structures and how the ability of students to tell historical narratives depends on their individual competence level, both in a first and second language. However, historical biliteracy has to date been regarded mainly as a theoretical construct which would benefit from an empirical analysis that tests the descriptors provided for historical communication in a first and second language (Council of Europe, 2015). To this end, this paper conducts a corpus study of the bilingual historical narratives of secondary school students and provides evidence of the major cognitive discourse functions (CDFs) that appear in the literature (hypothesising about history, explaining history, describing historical events, expressing causality, taking an ideological stance, etc.). The results are tabulated and discussed, providing conclusions that may prove useful for L2 and history learning and curriculum development in bilingual education and CLIL settings. Thus, this paper intends, for the first time, to provide empirical support for L2 historical literacy classifications and to describe the integration of history content and language (L2) by the end of compulsory schooling in secondary education.

Expanding the Horizons for Critical Literacy in a Bilingual Preschool Classroom: Children’s Responses in Discussions with Gender-Themed Picture Books

The current study explores how picture books can be used in bilingual classrooms to support more critical understandings of gender stereotypes by preschool children. The research uses a reader-response perspective that stresses the importance of the reader’s role in interpreting texts as well as sociocultural theory to analyze the social dynamics of teacher–child interactions. The participants were four-year-old, Korean–English bilingual children attending a Korean Language School in the midwest of the USA. The findings suggested that literary discussions about gender-themed picture books using both Korean and English languages promoted children’s critical thinking about gender roles. By sharing empirical examples of children’s authentic discussions, the study provides early childhood teachers with insights on how gender-themed picture books can be used as a medium to open up authentic discussions about gender roles in bilingual settings. Through valuing children’s responses to the reading of the picture books, the teachers encourage children to become more active learners. Their personal responses were valued in discussions, and they began to see themselves as having the authority to make judgments about what they read.

Practiced Linguistic-Cultural Ideologies and Educational Policies: A Case Study of a “Bilingual Sweden Finnish School”

ABSTRACTThis article explores linguistic-cultural ideologies and educational policies as they emerge and are negotiated in everyday life in a bilingual school setting located in the geopolitical spaces of Sweden. Taking sociocultural theory and discourse analysis as points of departure, we focus on empirical examples of classroom interaction and locally established formal policing. Linguistic-cultural ideologies and educational policies that frame life at the school are investigated by employing nexus analytical methods, focusing on social (inter)actions through which a number of locally and nationally relevant discourses circulate. Our findings indicate that refocusing ideology and policy research from the lens of a practiced perspective allows the situated and distributed nature of everyday life to inform issues related to bilingualism as well as their relations to wider societal discourses. Furthermore, our analysis highlights the crucial role of educators in (re)locating bilingual education in its societal contexts as well as making these connections visible in classrooms.